Oxidation Never Felt So Good
by watergurl123
Summary: Rory finally grows a backbone, I let her have a little idiotic fun. She finds Jess on the porch instead of Lorelai. A good, old-fashioned, done-a-million-times retelling of Nick and Nora. Literati.
1. Chapter 1

**Hey, back with yet another new story. This is just kind of a teaser chapter, very short. I'm testing the waters here, so if you like it _PLEASE _review. I know you're all probably incessantly annoyed and tired of this episode, but hey I have no life and I love it, so it was my prerogative to make yet another story about it. I hope you like it. And once again _please _review and thanks for reading.**

Disclaimer: I do not own anything affiliated with Gilmore Girls.

**Chapter 1**

"Hey Rory, where's Jess?" Luke asked, taking a plate piled high with food from Lorelai.

"He's getting a soda." She replied casually. She took a seat on the left side of the table, next to Luke. She looked at her plate hungrily, anticipating how delicious everything would be.

She heard a noise over her shoulder, and looked out the window to see Jess on the back porch, holding what appeared to be one of Lorelai's Heinekens. She scoffed in her mind, _'Soda my ass…'_

She heard Sookie and her mother discussing garlic bread, and quickly realized Lorelai was heading into the kitchen. She decided she needed to do damage control, knowing that if Lorelai found Jess, the evening could turn very ugly.

"Oh, I'll get it Mom. That way I can definitively say I've touched a stove once in my life." She said this with as much ease and nonchalance as she could muster, throwing a smile over her shoulder as she scurried into the kitchen.

As she was about to open the back door, she remembered she should probably get the garlic bread first, since causing a fire was not on her to do list.

She opened the stove door and was about to grab the pan, when she realized she wasn't wearing an oven mitt. "Right, I want to tell them I've touched a stove, not be able to physically show them the evidence."

She grabbed a mitt and quickly pulled the bread out, tossing it onto the burners. She threw the mitt on the counter and opened the back door.

Jess had just successfully removed the bottle cap and taken a sip, when he heard the door open behind him. He turned slightly, twisting his body to see Rory standing in the doorway.

She quietly shut the door behind her. "Now see, when I asked if you wanted a soda, it was more of a yes or no question. There wasn't supposed to be a third option." She pointedly looked at the drink in his hand.

"Well what can I say? I like choices." He replied while taking another swig as he slowly sat down on the top step.

She rolled her eyes and came to sit next to him, at the same time successfully snatching the drink out of his hand.

He stared ahead as he smirked, but used his right hand to casually rub his jaw, his fingers appearing to lazily cover his mouth. "You ever had one?" He murmured through his fingers, while glancing sideways at her.

Her head bobbed in a tiny affirmation. "Once when I was fourteen. I'd just watched 'The Breakfast Club' for about the twentieth time and I was feeling a little 'John Bender-ish'. My mother was gone on business."

His hand dropped from his face as he fully turned his head to look at her, smirking wider. "Well, we all gotta start somewhere."

She rolled her eyes for the second time that night. "Yeah, start and finish." She remembered the nausea she'd felt after consuming it in less than twenty minutes.

Impulsively, she brought the beer to her lips, taking a small sip.

Jess raised his eyebrows at her but said nothing as he hunched over, leaning his elbows on his knees and clasping his hands under his chin. He looked down into his entwined hands, his thumbs brushing against his lips as he smiled softly and shook his head.

As she took another sip, she glanced at him, furrowing her brows in a defensive expression that could only say, _'What? Does this surprise you?'_

But as she brought it back down from her mouth, she frowned at her hand. This was weird. And stupid. And different. And just completely…_weird._

Sensing that her mood had shifted into something more serious, and seeing the pensive and tense shape of her mouth and forehead, Jess softly pulled the beer from her hand.

He took a much larger sip than she had, expertly letting it dangle precariously between his index and middle finger.

Rory's mind was very much engaged. This situation was so…bizarre. She'd never told anyone other than Lane about her one-time-only drinking experience. Not even Dean. But then, chugging a beer in your mother's kitchen and throwing it back up in the next hour didn't seem like an anecdote he'd want to hear. Or that she would feel like sharing.

Which was the precise reason she felt so confused. She'd never felt like sharing that story, ever. It made her feel dirty and tainted, a blotch of ink on her perfectly clean, crisp record. _Good girls don't throw up cheap beer in a blue toilet bowl._

Yet here she was, willingly telling a boy she'd met five minutes ago that she was (contrary to popular belief) not perfect.

Even more confusing was that she still felt…good. She hadn't felt ashamed or lowered her eyes in embarrassment, stuttering excuses about stupidity and naivete.

It just felt so normal. _She_ felt normal. An average kid, a teenager. Not a saint. The entire situation was so easy. As she looked at Jess, she realized why.

He was probably the last person on earth eligible for sainthood. Well, maybe not the last, Hitler or Manson probably held that position.

She stared at him, openly. "You're a bad influence." She stated it simply, without accusation, just a simple fact.

"You know, I tell myself that everyday." He stated, heavy on the sarcasm.

"Nice one Verona." She smiled despite herself.

She took the beer from his hand, taking one last sip before he finished it completely.

He licked his lips. "Maybe your halo could use some rust." He set the bottle beside him on the step, between their bodies.

She was quiet as she picked the bottle up, absentmindedly running her finger around the edge of the lip. "Are you coming back inside?"

"Is that my only choice?" He asked, smirking as he reminded her of his aforementioned love of options.

"Well I guess you could always go back to the diner." She answered with a casual shrug.

"You know…there still is that third choice." He looked at her slyly.

In her bedroom, that third choice hadn't felt like much of an option, but now it somehow seemed just respectable a plan as any.


	2. Chapter 2

**Second update and only a day later, I'm on a roll. Anyway thank you for the reviews, people that did. I'm glad some of you seem to like it. And like I said I would, I've made this chapter much longer, as most of them will be. Thank you for reading and _PLEASE_ review. It makes my day (even to read criticism).**

Disclaimer: I do not own anything affiliated with Gilmore Girls.

**Chapter 2:**

"You're very persistent." She sighed as she looked down at her shoes. She placed the bottle on the step below her.

"Is that a yes?" He quirked one eyebrow at her, watching as she nudged the bottle gently with the toe of her shoe.

She twisted her mouth into an anxious frown, wringing her hands. "I don't want my mom to worry."

"Why would she?" He asked. A worried mother was a foreign concept to him.

"Because you're knew and she doesn't know that much about you. And I've never really…done anything like this before." She replied quietly while shaking her leg, a nervous habit.

"What, walked around past nine?" He asked patronizingly, amusement evident on his face.

She shot him a warning look, narrowing her eyes. "It's not the hour, it's the company." When he just stared at her she decided to elaborate. "You're a boy. That's immediate cause for concern in the Gilmore mother handbook." He nodded his head in understanding.

"So, you're saying you've never walked around with a boy past nine?"

"No, I've done that too. This is just…different." She huffed, aggravated by his prying.

He smirked, but ended his line of questioning. "Then why don't you just go ask her?"

Just then the back door opened as Lorelai stepped onto the porch. "There you guys are. You've been gone for like, 15 minutes."

"Speak of the devil." Rory muttered under her breath.

"Uh, I think you mean speak of the angel." Lorelai said with an exaggerated smile. "Why are we speaking of me anyway?

"There was something I wanted to talk to you about." Rory stood up and walked onto the porch. "In the kitchen?" Lorelai looked confused but agreed and turned to go inside. As soon as she was in the door, Rory quickly turned around and gestured for Jess to hurriedly hide the beer bottle.

He rolled his eyes, but pushed it off the porch into a bush, as he whispered that they could pick it up later.

"Very smooth." Rory said sarcastically before going into the kitchen.

"So, what's up?" Lorelai looked at Rory expectantly while crossing her arms.

"Um…I was wondering if me and Jess could kind of…ditch on dinner?" Rory said nervously, twisting her arms in front of her. "I don't think he feels very comfortable here."

"Ditch, what do you mean?" Lorelai stuttered out, confused. This was unlike Rory.

"Well, he asked me if we could just go for a walk. I could show him all the sites, point out places around town," Rory said, "I think he's just…a little overwhelmed. Maybe starting out with a dinner with a bunch of new people wasn't the best first step." She looked at her mom hesitantly.

"I guess that's okay" Lorelai said slowly. "You're just going to walk around? Well that sounds…boring." She finished with a frown.

"It was his suggestion, not mine." Rory said as way of explanation.

The two of them stared at each other silently, their stances and expressions awkward.

"This is…" Lorelai trailed off.

"Weird." Rory stated quietly.

"Yeah." Lorelai said. "Why is this so weird?" She put her hands on her hips.

"Because it's a guy?" Rory offered lamely, but that wasn't very convincing. She'd walked around with Dean. _But Dean wasn't shipped off from New York for getting into trouble._

"I guess it's just…different." Lorelai said finally. "I've ever only seen you with one boy before. You've only ever had girl friends, and those were a select few."

"Yeah I know what you mean." Rory said while looking at her hands. She knew they were both skirting around the real issue of concern. "But, he seems nice." She offered a small smile.

"Nice huh?" Lorelai asked incredulously while staring at the back door. She'd only met the kid twice, but neither time would she use that adjective to describe him.

"I mean, he's not very talkative, but he was friendly I guess."

"Right." Lorelai just looked at her, silently saying _'Ok, we'll see.' _"Well I guess just be back here by eleven, you've got school in the morning. And be careful. Really careful." She said the last words pointedly, emphasis on really.

"I will I promise. We'll just walk, I'll show him some sites, and then we'll be back. Nothing dangerous or concerning." She gestured with her hands, emphasizing the truth of her words.

"Okay, well have fun. Just not my kind of fun." Lorelai cocked an eyebrow at her with a suggestive grin.

"Yes, because that is my reputation." Rory rolled her eyes good-naturedly and kissed her mom on the cheek.

As she pulled back Lorelai gave her a funny puzzled look.

"I'm sorry, do I smell…" She just looked at Rory with narrowed eyes, but after a moment just shook her head, deciding whatever it was must have been ludicrous. "Forget it, bye sweets."

Rory eased out of her panic, fearing that her mom had smelled the alcohol on her breath. It wasn't a significant amount, but an amount all the same. "Bye mom."

She walked onto the porch to find Jess in the same position. "We're good."

He nodded his head while standing up. He walked off the steps, reaching into the bushes to grab the bottle. "Where should we toss this?"

"Our cans are on the side of the house." She told him while coming down the steps.

"Ok." He walked over to the side, tossing the bottle onto the top of a black garbage bag. "So where to?"

"I guess we can just walk around the square. That pretty much is the town." They walked about a foot apart, him with his arms shoved deep in his pockets, and her with them wrapped around herself.

They reached the square in a comfortable silence, observing everything around them. As they passed a red house with a white picket fence she turned to him.

"When you're walking passed Mr. Larson's house, be sure to keep off the sidewalk. He has a Jack Russell. It bites." She stated simply while pointing to the house on her right.

He chuckled quietly. "How old were you?"

"Seven." She said with a smile. "I've still got a few teeth marks on my ankle." She pulled up her left pant leg to show him.

"Battle scars. Impressive." He observed her ankle to see a row of four little white indentations on her skin.

They walked closer now, maybe only six inches apart. She showed him Gypsy's, Mr. Twickenham's house, Harry the Twinkle Light Man's House of Twinkle Lights, Doose's Market, the Chat Club, and they finally passed Andrew's bookstore.

"And this is my favorite place in Stars Hollow. Well, other than Luke's and the Crap Shack." She gestured toward Andrew's with a smile.

"Crap shack?" He questioned.

"Oh, that's what we named our house." She said like it was common knowledge.

"Nice." He stopped beside her and peered through the window. "Good selection?"

"Pretty good. I mean, it's not very eclectic or out there, but it has the classics and some good modern pieces."

"Good to know." He smiles at her. "Maybe one day we'll actually make it inside."

"Yeah, we can come back next week sometime." She twists her hands and looks down at her feet, her face feeling hot.

"I'm gonna hold you to that." He smirks sideways at her, before starting to walk backwards. "Coming?"

She grins and walks after him as he spins to walk beside her again. A minute later her stomach growls audibly and she raises a hand to it. He raises his eyebrows at her.

"I wasn't lying when I said I was starving." She says while dropping her hand. She frowns as she realizes just how hungry she is.

"Ok." He nods his head and abruptly cuts across the street.

"Jess!" She calls after him, bewildered by his sudden detour. "Where are you going?" He doesn't turn around so she grudgingly jogs after him. She is about to question him again when she realizes where he's heading. "Luke's is closed."

"Thanks Captain Obvious." He responds sarcastically while continuing to walk to the door. He pulls a key off the top of the doorframe, a hiding spot Luke had informed him of earlier.

"I just meant that if Luke isn't here, that means no one is cooking, which means there's no food." She shot him a glare. "So what's the point of going to an empty diner with no food?"

"You do realize there's still food on the premises right?"

"And who, might I ask, is going to cook this food?" As he opens the door he turns to raise his eyebrows once in a quick motion with a small grin.

She scoffs. "You're going to cook?"

"Yep." He says while flicking on the lights and heading into the kitchen.

She stares at his retreating form with an unbelieving look on her face. "Ok." She can hear opening and closing of drawers and cupboards and the clanging of pots and pans. "You gonna be alright in there?" She asks while smile.

"You want your damn burger or not?" He calls back, sounding frustrated. She giggles to herself before going behind the counter to start the coffee maker.

As she watches the coffee begin to drip she decides to head into the kitchen. She hears sizzling and smells an aroma wafting into the room.

"Smells good." She states, walking in to see him standing at the stove, flipping two burgers.

"Cheese?" He asks, grabbing a slice for himself before pausing for her answer. She nods her head so he grabs another slice, placing one on each burger. She watches him prepare the food in silence, handing him two plates from the shelf behind her when it's finished.

He's created an assembly line placing buns, lettuce, tomatoes, pickles, onions, ketchup, and mustard on the counter. They both go down the line, picking their desired toppings. She finishes first and watches as he picks everything but the pickles. She smiles to herself, knowing she doesn't like pickles either.

She forces him to let her clean up the remaining items, insisting that since he cooked the food she needs to do something to help. She pours herself some coffee before sitting down. As she sits at the counter with him she looks around her.

"This is strange." She says with a furrowed brow.

"Thanks for the confidence boost." He says.

"I mean being in the diner at night, just the two of us. I've never been in it when it's this empty. It's kind of eerie." She says while looking over her shoulder at all the stacked chairs.

"You wanna leave?" He replied while wiping his lip with a napkin.

"What about the food?

He grabs the burger off her plate, much to her displeasure, and wraps a napkin around the bottom half of it, before presenting it to her.

"Well aren't you just full of good ideas." She takes the burger from his hand.

He wraps his burger the same as hers before standing up and heading to the door.

"What about the mess?" She asks gesturing to their plates and the dirty pots and pans in the back. He waved a hand dismissively and told her to leave them. He opens the door, about to leave, when he notices she's not behind him. He rolls his eyes as he sees her pouring her coffee into a disposable cup.

She snaps a lid on and scurries around the counter, burger and coffee in each hand.

"That has to be the most disgusting food and drink combination I've ever seen." He scrunches his nose. She walks past him taking a bite of her burger before sipping her coffee.

"Um, I beg to differ." She states haughtily.

"Give me one example." He replies, biting his burger.

"Babies blood and chocolate cake." She says in a 'duh' manner.

"As opposed to all the food choices that babies blood would go excellent with." He shook his head while smiling.

They walked slowly, eating quietly. She points out a few more things, the gazebo, and Kim's antiques, where she went into a lengthy description of her friendship with Lane.

"I mean, her mom means well and all, she's just…scary." She concluded while looking ahead.

He listened attentively but made few comments, kicking pebbles down the sidewalk. He looked up to see a large brown building with two big sliding doors. "What's this?"

"Ms. Patty's. It's a dance studio" She finished her burger, tossing the napkin into a nearby trashcan. She sipped her coffee while she watched Jess walk up to the doors.

He grabbed the handle and pushed it to the side. The door easily slid open and he smirked, _'Of course they don't lock their doors.'_

"What are you doing? Jess we can't go in there. It should've been locked." This was not good. She was getting horrible Dean flashbacks. She tossed her now empty cup into the can.

"Relax." He stepped inside.

Rory looked around the streets. "Come on Jess. Seriously, someone could see us!"

He looked back out onto the streets, stretching his arms and gesturing to the right and left. "Oh yeah, one of the thousands of people." He turned back and continued walking farther into the studio.

She ground her foot into the pavement, debating whether to enter or stay outside. She finally sighed and followed him in. He was walking around slowly, glancing casually at the pictures on the wall.

She hurried to close the door behind her, trying to make them as inconspicuous as possible.

She came to stand behind him as he stopped to look at all the pictures of Ms. Patty hanging on the back wall. The ones on the far left were from her long lost days on Broadway, when she wore extravagant costumes and headdresses, and the ones to the far right showed her as she was now.

"Ms. Patty?" He questioned looking at the picture of a thin young woman in her mid-twenties decked out in a sparkling pink dress fringed in feathers. She was twirling on stage and smiling brightly at the camera.

"Yeah." Rory smiled at the picture. Ms. Patty had one of the brightest personalities she'd ever seen.

He walked to the right, now looking at a rather robust woman in her fifties with fiery red curly hair, a cigarette in one hand, and a baton in the other.

"And this?" He pointed to the picture.

"Ms. Patty." Rory giggled.

Jess's face was puzzled as he looked from the pictures of her youth to her most recent one. Finally he just nodded and walked to a different wall.

She continued to look at all the pictures smiling to herself. Suddenly she heard Jess quietly chuckling.

"What?" As she stood next to him her face immediately began to turn beat red.

"Wow, aren't we a little Anna Pavlova." He smirked as he watched her face burn brightly.

In front of them was a picture of the ballet class of 1993, and there, second row from the bottom, in all her eight-year-old glory, was 'Ms. Lorelai Leigh Gilmore'.

"Oh my god." She gaped at the picture.

"Nice tutu." He grinned. "And I like this pose, it's very 'Swan Lake'."

She was attempting to do a plie but her lack of balance was causing her to teeter to the left.

"You're funny." She snapped at him, glaring daggers at the side of his head.

He laughed. "I'm just kidding. It's cute."

"No, this is not cute, it's embarrassing. I was terrible."

"We can't be good at everything." He shrugged as he turned away from the picture and walked to the middle of the room where there were several beanbag chairs. He softly sank into one, stretching his arms above his head and then letting them drop to his sides. He sighed and leaned his head back, closing his eyes.

Rory turned to watch him. She quietly walked over and pulled a beanbag from behind him forward so she could sit directly across from him. She sat down and stared at him as he softly breathed in and out.

She drummed her fingers against the plastic, glancing at her watch to see that it was 10:30. She needed to be heading back soon.

She tapped her feet, a little anxious now that everything was so quiet. She was definitely not letting either of them fall asleep. She picked at the cheap plastic fabric, little bits of if flaking off onto her nails.

"So why'd you do it?" He asked suddenly, lifting his head and fixing his eyes on her.

"Do what?" She asked confused.

"Share that beer with me."

"Oh…I don't…" She stuttered out, frowning at her lack of response.

"I mean call me crazy, but despite that touching story, you don't exactly strike me as the drinking type."

"I'm not." She said firmly.

"Exactly my point."

"I don't know. I just…wanted to." She tried to shrug carelessly but her actions were stiff and angular.

He smiled. "I'm not trying to put you on the spot or anything. I'm sorry."

"No, it's not you, I'm just confused. With myself, I guess. This evening has been very…strange." She wrapped her arms around her knees.

"Right. You mentioned something like that." He sat up straighter now. "Walking around with boys past sundown, crazy stuff."

"And like I mentioned earlier, it's not about that. It's the entire situation. I just met you and we're already palling around like friends." The more she spoke the more she had to say. "And yes, it has a little to do with the fact that you're a boy, but it's more about the type of boy that you are." She let out a breath.

"And what type is that exactly?" He asked, scowling.

She was about to say that he was dangerous but she caught herself. That was an assumption, a stereotype, one she'd proven to be false.

"I don't know." She finally answered quietly. He _should_ have been dangerous. Wasn't that part of the 'big city, get into trouble, shipped off without your consent, angry kid' package?

The whole evening, beginning with their conversation on the porch she'd been waiting for something, anything, to back up that claim. But there'd been nothing. At least, nothing in her eyes.

She was sure that if she'd seen the night through her mother's perspective her opinion would be very different. Sharing a beer and breaking into Ms. Patty's probably weren't on Lorelai's approved list of activities.

But even knowing this hadn't stopped her from wanting to do those things. Sharing a beer had been easy, careless, rash, stupid, but somehow freeing. She just felt relaxed with Jess. Like she wasn't being judged. He didn't care if she screwed up, because she was certain he'd done much worse.

She realized she didn't know anything about Jess. There was no definitive way to say what type of boy he was. All she knew was that she liked whatever type he was. He was funny, sarcastic, quick-minded, and just over all fun to hang around.

"I don't know anything about you." She stated with a large smile.

He smirked back at her and she thought he understood what she was trying to say.

**Thank you for reading, _PLEASE review_. Third installment coming soon.**


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